Act 4: Deep Despair
Act 4 Detailed
Players in Attendance: Adam (GM), Air, Nine, Frost
Players Removed: Tanasen

Reputation Bonuses
Nine: +1 Antagonistic, Intolerant, Unbalanced,
Sloppy, and Charming
Air: +1 Decisive
Adam: +1 Decisive and +1 Hard-Working
Frost: +1 Careful


«Plot» Adam says, "Setting: Freight Elevator, Atlantis"
«Plot» Adam says, "Characters: Air, Nine, Frost, and Adam"

Air switches to the other frequency for a moment and checks in with the Security office regarding orders about hostility of the deeps.

Nine is here! In this elevator thingy with her comrades inside, and she pulls her Alta because others have their sidearms out as well? She waits, anticipation making adrenaline pump. She is very quiet, not doing anything, just staring and waiting for the elevator to stop and open. Sustained spells are abandoned for focus purposes, and she keeps her gun a bit under the coat.

The elevator makes its way down into The Deep. Small metal signs in the industrial freight elevator note that The Deep is slang for the real destination: Deep Storage. On one side there is a map of how the storage warehouse is sectioned off. It turns out that a few of them are done by company entity— Yamatetsu being one of them along with other megacorps like UniOmni and Ares.

The otherwise boring three minute ride comes to a close as there is a jerky stop and the inertia is no longer felt. The hiss of hydraulics seeps out as the doors begin to open.

Air keeps the pistol grip of his Alpha in his right hand, although pointing a non-threatening downwards and keeps his left hand free, stood the side of the doorway, leaning over to peer through. Air has one frequency set up with the party, and another for the DF security office now.

Frost stands near the back of the elevator, he wears his helmet now and looks a little odd because he doesn’t have a set of security armor to match. He holds his browning in hand, ready for any emergencies that might arrives

Adam is towards the middle-back. Noting some of the signs in the elevator, he occupies his time with reading over them.

The doors to the freight elevator open and reveal a dark landscape of containers you may see on cargo ships. These large containers are stacked on top of each other in various colors, likely made of synthetic materials. The area that immediately spills out in front of them is open, having a modest amount if equipment such as forklifts to move things around. The operators are nowhere to be found. From the look of things, this 'Warehouse' is pretty damn expansive— like going into a mega shopping mall when you are five.

Nine wows softly, the little kid in her thrilled by the expanse of just stuff and colors out there. She shuts up though and then buckles down, ready to get moving as soon as Air leads on or gives the word to do something.

Air brings up the map he hopes is on the chip for Deep Storage, overlaying it through his orientation system onto his inner eye. A dot blinks indicating his position.

«Seems we gotta find people before we can find the woman. Four meter spread between people, follow me.» He steps out of the elevator and advances towards the center of this open area.

Frost gestures for the others to move ahead and notes on the comm that he will bring up the rear guard, he waits for the others to move ahead and then follows along behind everyone, keeping his eyes open for threats.

Air straightens up and releases his rifle, letting it dangle off his LBE gear muzzle pointing down between his legs. He holds up a hand to stop the team and maintains a watch over the area around him.

Commlink-Air> Air says, "Her mental and physical state is as yet unknown. Who wants to try and talk to these people?"

Nine stops about 2 meters back away from Air before looking all around, and she smiles faintly to a few of them, just to be kind. She subvocalizes…

Commlink-Little Sister> Nine says, "I can try, if you would like. I need to know what we need though. And questions to present."

Frost holds up at the rear, he keeps an eye open for threats and summons a couple of F1 watchers as support just in case something happens. He listens to the comm chatter but has no suggestions for the team at the moment.

Commlink-Little Sister> Nine says, "They just said 'find blah'? Not 'rescue blah'? Or, 'force blah to come back to blah'?"

GM Note: Nine has gained +1 in Antagonistic

Commlink-Air> Air says, "Cut the chatter Nine. She's human, female, five six in her forties. Brown hair, brown eyes, brown skin. Hispanic. We are to bring her in. Margarita Sanchez, but don't let that info go easily."

Commlink-Aquis> Adam says, "Hispanic? Wonder if she is an Azltander. That would explain a lot."

Commlink-Snowman> Frost says, "Any word why she is down here?"

Commlink-Little Sister> Nine frowns deeply, "Look, you asked who wanted to talk to these people, I offered but stated what I needed. Also, was trying to get an idea of how to set up a spirit to find it, if you are going to be disrespectful that is not going to help us." She actually lets a soft grumble rumble through the comm, but then shuts up completely.

GM Note: Nine has gained +1 in Rude.

Air maintains his vigilance, silently entreating the party through his transducer.

Nine glances over toward Air, not happy, but then shifts to astral vision and glances all around herself to the people who are here, seeing if there are any astral disturbances, as well. If none, or any visibly awakened, she will start with a watcher spirit summoning, as well, no movements and no sound involved.

None appear to be visibly awakened.

Commlink-Air> Air says, "Nine, we do not need you giving out a series of examples asking how the orders were given. This is wasting time. We need information from these people to proceed to our objective. I do not want you 'blah'ing in my ear."

Commlink-Snowman> Frost says, "My question is valid though. If we knew why she was down here it might help narrow the search parameters."

Commlink-Little Sister> Nine says, "Fine, I realize that my question was unimportant, and you have re-established my inability to communicate effectively. Thank you, Air."

GM Note: Nine has gained +1 in Intolerant.

Nine finally shuts up and seems to be a bit pissed off, but then she gets the F1 watcher spirit formed, and then she pauses and waits a moment before tossing it an F1 mind link and relaying information to it, silently.

Commlink-Air> Air says, "I imagine it's because she's SINless and the DF is exploiting them. Regardless, that information was not given. Nine, please return to the elevator and take it back up if that is your attitude."

Adam nods his head— that is the most likely cause. SINless get exploited all of the time.

Commlink-Little Sister> Nine says, "Look, I am here to help you, Air, to do whatever it is we are supposed to do down here. I would do it for free. For. Free. Because I love you and want to be here to help, but you will not treat me like I am worthless, especially when I am going to try my damnedest and work hard for you. I might have good ideas. You copped the attitude first, so knock it off, and be nice to me. Stop treating me like I am just an idiot and some child you can boss around unless you have a really good reason. Ok? It hurts, thanks."

GM Note: Nine has gained +1 in Unbalanced.

Commlink-Snowman> Frost says, "People, you do realize that someone is probably monitoring all communications going on down here. You are Smith and Robinson, and Smith is the Captain of this little unit, so stop being all sensitive and let him act like a captain. You act like a medic, and save the drama for your bedroom!"

Nine remains here, not leaving the team, just subvocalizes everything through the mic quickly and calmly, not letting the anger get into her tones, even though it might seep from her aura. She relays all of the info mentally to the watcher spirit and then asks it to go find this person.

Commlink-Little Sister> Nine says, "You are right, Frost. I apologize."

GM Note: Nine has gained +1 in Sloppy.
GM Note: Frost has gained +1 in Careful.

Commlink-Snowman> Frost says, "Bob!"

Fortunately, all of the Deep Dwellers are skittering about either on their own business or away from the team. The watchers goes off to find an average height Hispanic woman, brown eyes and hair, and comes back in less than a second with one three meters away.

Frost sighs faintly, trying not to let it go over the comm channels, professionalism was not Nines strong point and here it was coming to the surface. He continues to look around for anything that could be a threat, who knows when a mob of trolls might come out of the woodwork.

Air waits silently, his eyes scanning the immediate area, hands down at his sides in a less threatening stance, not that the rigged up in fully sealed security armour can look friendly.

Nine keeps scanning the area and lets all her sustaining drop for now, but when the watcher spirit reports back, she gets back on the comm, subvocals.

Commlink-Little Sister> Nine says, "3 meters away. To the <direction>."

Commlink-Little Sister> Nine says, "Someone that fits the desc, not sure of exactness."

Air glances his eyes in that direction and then makes a hand motion moving people to right over there. That being Frost and Nine since Adam was left. «Go talk, extract whatever information you can.»

Commlink-Snowman> Frost says, "I think the fastest way to locate the target will be to ask for the woman by name and offer some money as an incentive"
Frost moves up to Nine, and will escort her during the interrogation of the homeless

Nine moves immediately to begin approaching, hopefully as a non threat, and then tries to find the woman herself, "Hello, there." Nine says softly, kindly.

Commlink-Air> Air says, "Unfortunately we have no scrip. Credsticks will be worthless to these people."

Commlink-Little Sister> Nine says, "I got all kinds of abilities with which I can barter. (That just sounds wrong.)"

The lady is a bit startled that Nine approaches her and she says, "Hello…" with body language and eyes that say 'What do you want? Go away!' A few of the people around her stop skittering away and look closely— staring.

Frost remains a few steps behind Nine, looking more odd than imposing. He does hold a pistol in his hand, but tries to keep his hands behind his back, looking semi-casual.

Air scans the crowd somewhat casually, noting other women that would fit his description. He doesn't make any moves however.

Nine watches the other woman for a moment before her expression softens, "Hey, you do not look well, are you okay? Are you hungry?" Nine pulls out one of her 10 ration bars she always keeps on hand, and then she offers it out to the woman before saying softly, "Want one?"

GM Note: Nine has gained +1 in Charming.

When Nine makes the offer— just about every person in the area takes the moment to descend on her like a looter in a riot…

Air activates his suits loudspeaker and attempts to prevent the flow of people by shouting and stepping forwards hand held out. "Oi! Stop, Dee Eff Security!"

GM Note: Air has gained +1 in Decisive.

That’s about what it takes to send the bums scattering— running away for dear life. Not just the attackers, the woman too— and the few bystanders that were not moving. It is as if a bomb was dropped.

Nine sighs softly and then sends her watcher to keep tabs on the woman mentally before saying out, "I think he said STOP, not run." Leadership?

Frost starts to move, but then slows as people start running from Air. He glances around and then simply does nothing but stand there.

Adam looks around as everyone starts to go apeshit— the lady included. "Well that’s one way to keep the threat down."

Air looks somewhat nonplussed, stopping his travel and letting his arm go back down. «I did not expect it to be that effective. Perhaps DF security has a rep down here.»

Commlink-Snowman> Frost says, "Alright Robinson, let’s not show the food next time. If you want to use it as a bribe that’s fine, but be very very discreet with it."

"We'll have to check with the locals on that— otherwise we have a rather uphill battle getting info," Adam observes objectively.

Nine nods to agree with what Air said, and then she starts walking in the direction that the people had gone, doing so normally without hurry while still being cautious and watching her surroundings. She subvocalizes again.

Commlink-Little Sister> Nine says, "Aye, looks like it. sir. I think the easiest way to do this is to become hobos though. I am having a hard time getting 'close' when they are all afraid of us. Also, they are all hurting and not healthy, so sad."

Commlink-Little Sister> Nine says, "I think I can set up therapeutics for their condition as barter for info."

Frost moves along behind Nine, acting as her security as she tries to move about and find more of the locals that went into hiding.

Nine pauses though, glancing back to Frost and then just stops for now. She hangs near one of the containers, glancing over the scene again before she comms over the radio with the subvocal mic.

Air shakes his head inside the helmet and glances over to Adam. «Not willing to come down here naked. Try to empathies with one of them as we are.»

Commlink-Little Sister> Nine says, "Understood."

Adam looks over towards Nine and shakes his head a little. He motions for Nine to come over towards him.

Nine almost starts to walk again but then pauses and heads over to Adam when he beckons her.

Adam takes a deep breath and begins chanting in Enochian. His hands move in simple motions as a thin, blue-white vapor fogs over Nine like a steam vent's exhaust passing through the area. When the vision to her is no longer obscured— she looks like a bum.

GM Note: Adam has gained +1 in Decisive.

Commlink-Aquis> Adam says, "Problem Solved."

Commlink-Little Sister> Nine says, "Thank you, sir."

Commlink-Snowman> Frost says, "I guess I should let her go solo now then?"

Nine gives Adam a faint smile, and then she moves off in her worn out tee shirt and jeans to try some stealth as if she were going to scurry and skitter away from the DEE EFF security like the others had done, though not far.

Commlink-Aquis> Adam says, "Unless you want to give her some astral support."

Commlink-Snowman> Frost says, "I'll send Cara with her, at least we will know what’s happening."

Frost starts moving back to the others, a small spirit in the shape of a mouse astrally flies over to ride on Nines shoulder as she goes about.

Commlink-Little Sister> Nine says, "Can you do this for Tinman? He and I could do really well down here helping people."

Commlink-Aquis> Adam says, "What I did for you? It'd be a stretch— but possible."

Commlink-Little Sister> Nine says, "Aye, what you did for me."

Air turns to Tanasen and waves him over, «Send a drone to keep an eye on her from out of sight.» He then casts his eyes upwards to see height of this area and start figuring out this whole place.

Commlink-Snowman> Frost says, "I've got her under surveillance right now."

Adam is already focusing quite a bit on keeping Nine's illusion up and running. Keeping a metallic hand directed towards her— he motions another hand towards Tanasen. The illusion comes on a lot stronger for him— more like the fabric of light gets bent and warped. When it is done, he is also a bum. The mage doesn’t say anything after that— keeping his eyes close and wordlessly mouthing something in a different tongue.

GM Note: Adam has gained +1 in Hard-Working.

Commlink-Air> Air says, "Report in every 10 minutes. I'm going to keep an eye on our Waterboy."

Tanasen shows up with the rest of them, stepping up beside Frost. "So…what are we doing here again?" He asks as he rubs at his neck. "Got any ID photos or biometric data on the girl we're supposed to find? I don't think verbal descriptions are going to cut it down here."

Frost points to Air, and nods to Tanasen "Ask the Captain, he is running the show."

Air is stood over by Adam, still watching the area, always paranoid.

Nine remains stealthy and a ninja bum while hiding behind a container and peeking out at the team and watching them intently, as if she were on the side of the bums, curious about these people. She is not especially far yet.

Adam is standing over by a container— quite preoccupied in making sure Tanasen and Nine look the way they do.

The little mouse spirit rests on Nines shoulder, and keeps an eye on her in case of trouble.

Nine goes ahead and passes a mind link off toward Air, if he accepts, but if not, then she just remains in stealth mode, watching the team get prepped.

Tanasen grumbles about lack of proper communications and walks over to Air. "Yo. Got anything beyond words I can work with on this little duck hunt? I've never been good at going from verbal descriptions."

Air nods to Tanasen, his left hand comes up and pops open an access patch on his right arm put there specifically by him. He unfolds a flap of his own skin and pulls out a data chip. The skin flap is put back and the armour patch resecured as he holds the chip out to Tana. "I'll need that back when you're done. Tune your comm into 35:65:23:11." The quieter than the loudspeaker intercom on his suit sounds a little tinny.

Nine reaches up and scritches at her shoulder, but then sneaks a finger to stroke the little mouse spirit, being quite glad that she is there. Cara always makes Nine feel better, even though Nine is semi frustrated, it is calming.

Frost remains quietly, his attention divided between himself and Cara. He looks around as best he can, switching back and forth between the two perceptions.

Tanasen takes a moment to pull his deck free of its case on his back, slotting the chip for a moment to copy the contents before handing back. "Got a time limit on this to finish?" He asks as he reseats his deck on his back, while pulling a cable from it to plug into his temple datajack.

Commlink-Air> Air replies over comms, "We got ration packs for a day or two. Unless you fancy what these people are eating."

Nine relays her location where she is waiting even though he might have been able to hear her breathing. She also mentions that she has spells for nutrition if needed, and she also asks if there is anything else about this that he can give her to help as far as info. The thoughts come at a moderate, patient speed, and she does not seem to have any emotion in the link right now.

Air relays a mental image of the chick to Nine.

Nine thanks Air, and then she tries to focus on this image that he shows while also focusing on commanding a watcher spirit to maybe find a match? She is not sure if it will work, but it was more than the previous desc.

Tanasen reaches into the case once more, opening it enough to pull out two small birds from their foam slots. He takes a few moments to make sure they are fully charged and working properly, before they both take flight into the air and start winging their way quickly into other areas with their feeds coming back to Tanasen and his deck. «Ok. let’s get this over with.»

Commlink-Air> Air says, "Yes please."

Commlink-Snowman> Frost says, "I can try to send out watchers, but the odds are very very low. It helps that it’s a somewhat limited area, but watchers are better at finding auras than faces."

Tanasen is transformed by magic! Woo. Now to find this lady so they can go back where it's comfy.

Nine hangs out, waiting, watching, looking behind her to see if any other people have tried to come up on them to scope the scene. Sometimes, people are curious! And their team had been lingering. She scans.

Air looks about making some sort of base camp here, walking about and collecting whatever junk chairs the occupants have throw together and setting them up just off to the side from the elevator. «Base camp is the elevator, no other real way out of this place. Waterboy, Bob and I will remain here.»

Frost moves over and takes a chair, sitting down and trying to relax despite the fear of it collapsing under him. His attention wavers between his body and the images he gets from Cara sitting on Nines shoulder.

Commlink-Tinman> Tanasen says, "How the hell do they keep this many people down here, and not have sanitation or food issues? Last time I saw shit like this was back in Africa, and they were all about tearing the place to pieces for any useful scrap of metal or plastic. I'm surprised someone hasn't accidently flooded this section yet."

Commlink-Snowman> Frost says, "Maybe that’s why we are recovering this woman, so the corp can flood the area and clean it up without losing someone they want."

Commlink-Little Sister> Nine says, "Uncertain, sir… That would be horrible, though."

Commlink-Little Sister> Nine says, "Oh, I am ready to move with you, when needed."

Nine breathes in and then out and looks toward Tanasen while listening to what he says over the comm, the mind link dropping, and she scans, some more, and then she speaks to Cara softly, "Hey."

The small mouse spirit is astral at the moment, and responds on the same plane only "Yes?" it inquires curiously.

Commlink-Air> Air says, "Doubtful, these people have worth as cheap labour."

The little bird-drones flit about high above the stinky masses, scanning any faces that are out and about while Tanasen walks the beat, peering into places to try and get a better look at faces that try to hide from over head viewing.

Nine pets the mouse and says softly, "Thanks for being with me." as if she were talking to the spirit mainly itself, and then she drops her hands into her pockets and moves along for the next 20 minutes trying to find people with a casual and laze faire attitude, as if she were just wandering around, though she would probably try to talk to some of them. She makes sure to report in to Air after the first 10 minute marker to let him know she has not found anyone, and then also at the 20 minute marker to let him know that she still has not found anyone matching yet. She keeps searching, trying to not seem like she is out here to search, though, more to just wander and chill with these people, though her ulterior motive is definitely to find the woman and to help some.

Frost sits quietly at base camp, he doesn’t really move or say anything for a long time, and it’s easy when you summon elementals, you get used to sitting around for hours with little to no movements, and he isn’t some crazy shaman that dances about, for him it’s all mental focus.

Air is one of those nervous energy types, so he’s up and pacing around all the time. Assault rifle banging against the front of his armour as he strides up and down. Eventually he steers Adam into a chair and then resumes pacing.

Adam looks nice and thoughtful in that chair— ignore the fact he is weaving the fabric of life essence across the tapestry of reality to level of strain a construction worker might endure while carrying equipment across the desert! After this, he is going to need some &^$! tea.

In time, Nine finds a bum well enough to have a conversation— or at least one that talks back. "Hey," the woman says— looking around, "you haven't— y'know— heard anything about what’s going on, right?" Chatty Cathy type— mousey brown hair, blue eyes.

Nine definitely gets into this, once she gets past contemplating what Frost had said about flooding this area, though somewhat consoled by what Air said about cheap labor. Sorta. She feels extremely bad for Adam but thankful for his abilities keeping her disguised. She feels bad for the people here, and she tries to be kind but if anyone tries to attack her, she will definitely stunbolt them in front of their buddies if they need it, but until then, things are searchy searchy and walky walky and talky talky and chilly chilly.

Finally meeting up with Chatty Cathy, Nine glances all around when the other woman does before looking back to her, "No…?" Nine feigns ignorance, but then asks with curious green eyes, "What is? It is so awful down here. What's going on?"

The woman looks at Nine like she asked 'What’s wrong with eating a baby? Do they taste bad?' She replies with, "Are you new down here or something? Things were bad before— they are worse now— ever since the work started to slow down. I haven't seen anyone go topside in— weeks. Just the Loaders— bucket of bolts. Few of them break down, but they just fix them. The 'engineers' at least. Fraggin' sell outs."

Nine glances over toward Tanasen and then back toward the woman with a little nod and soft sigh, seeming to convey that she is loosening up some, "Sorry for being clueless, just, you know, scared." Nine runs a hand back through her different colored hair, probably just plain black. Nine glances downward before looking back up at Cathy, "Hey, I'm Kelly… what can I call you, ma'am?" Nine tries to be polite, not hard, and the shy girl, not hard, her usual roles in everyday life. She speaks softly.

The Chatty bum says, "Oh. I'm Kathy. And I aint no Ma'am. This aint topside, sugah. Man— they must have shipped you straight from the barges. I guess that’s good. If people are still coming in, maybe there will be work." She waves a finger, "Just don’t think they'll give ya a SIN. Only the Engineers got them. The rest of us— well not really. I think they like it like that." She leans in a whispers, "And whatever you do, stay away from the men in suits. You know, The Security? You don't want to end up chipped, sugah."

Nine gasps softly and glances around when Kathy mentions the chipped, "you mean… like, reprogrammed… that chipped?" she asks and softly shudders before looking back to Kathy, "Serious?" Nine does not want to ask too many questions at once, wanting to seem scared and concerned about the possibilities rather than to seem invested in questions. She tries to lead the woman on, to speak some more openly about things, watching with curious green eyes.

"Bobo?" Kathy laughs, "Big guy. Troll. Hard to miss. He really looks out for us— like a big brother. Margarita is the head of the Union when it formed. She took care of the rationing of food to all of us when we get paid. Before the Loaders— only some of us got work. She made sure our pay went to all of us getting fed and that all of us contributed. But without work, there isn’t much we can do but keep from going crazy and killing each other for…" She shivers, "I hope it doesn’t come to that. George? Oh, he’s a friend of mine. Real sweetheart."

Nine listens and then nods slightly, and she whispers softly to Kathy, "Well, I hope it does not get that bad… criminey." Nine really hates this, that they might be retrieving this woman for the DF security. Nine tries to backtrack to some fundamental info concerning the run in general, noticing that there were quite a few different corp type containers, "So, what did you do before all of this? Why won't they let us just go back?" she sighs, making the last question whiney, as if to be rhetorical while the first was not so much.

"Back," Kathy asks, "back where? None of us had a 'back'. None of us have SINs. We either stowed away on ships in storage crates or were smuggled in. We don't have the money to go back and even if we did— there is no promise that they'd do more than take our money and shoot us. We are /stuck/ here. We will die here."

Nine sighs deeply and then just shakes her head, "No… can't just give up like that, right? There might be some hope. Somewhere." Nine seems like she really wants to believe it herself. Whether there really is hope for them, that is a different question. She looks over to Kathy and says softly, "So, George said something about some DF team down here? Were they thinking about like doing something? I think they should hold off, really. Maybe, maybe instead of going out kamikaze, maybe there is hope, just, got to plan well. Right? Maybe not take out the team that is down here, because they will just send another or open the docking ports, and flood this, right? That would be bad, I know, I know people are losing hope, but, but there has to be a better way… do, do you think I could ever meet Margarita?"

Nine says "Is she still helping? I want to help."

GM Note: Nine has gained +1 Charming.

And after a successful conversation with a bum about the state of affairs, Nine is directed to their leader. The trek through the deep does not become more sense or more sporadic. Because of a lack of milestones, the whole 'community' seems amorphous and without structure. It also makes finding a centralized area to find leadership figures difficult. If it was not for the ork outside of the shipping container bouncing people from coming in— no one would really know.
The bum and the guard have a conversation, "Hey we need to speak to the Big Sis there." 'No can do.' "What

There is a pause of silence. "What?" She repeats.

"No visitors right now. Things are delicate."

"Yeah, and I’m here because things are fucked up. Same difference. C'mon."

"One second."

The ork gets out a CB radio and clicks it over, "Hey— couple o visitors out here… Nope, not him. Roger." The ork looks back to the two bums, "Not till Irons comes back."
Nine, aka Kelly, stops outside the shipping container with Kathy after all the conniving. Nine feels a little bothered by it, but she hopes to find what they need to know. Nine tucks her hands into her tatty jean pockets, and she looks over the ork for a moment before saying, "When will Irons be here?" she inquires softly, tilting her head and looking up at him curiously.

The ork looks over towards Nine and grunts, "Lady— he doesn't exactly keep to a schedule and I’m definitely not his keeper. He gets here when he gets here… and he’s here."

Yes that last part is confusing. A large troll comes from behind the two. Nine will recognize this as the Troll that she met in the clinic a few hours before. "Yeah— and now that I'm here I need to talk to the Boss, now."

Nine turns toward the man who approaches, and then she says softly, "Hullo. Can I accompany you, sir? I want to offer my help."

The troll looks around and down to Nine and says, "Sure kid. Just don't get in the way." With that the troll heads inside— the ork not stopping him or Nine in her disguised form. Kathy, the chatty Cathy, waves and goes back to doing nothing of vast importance like she was before.

Nine waves back to miss Kathy, and then she moves inside after the troll quickly so as not to lose her chance to meet with the run target woman. "Thank you." she tells the troll softly, and she glances around herself at the inside of the shipping container once she is in, taking a look both physically and astrally.

Frost walks around near the elevator, but his attention is somewhat diverted by the conversation with his ally spirit that is riding on Nines shoulder and keeping an eye on her.

Once inside— the room looks just like the rest. There is a table where a woman sits at— short dark hair, casual clothing. She would resemble a Rosey the Riveter if it wasn't over a century too late. "Irons," says the woman as she stands, "I was starting to think you got caught up in that slaughter."

"Tell me that wasn't you."

She doesn’t respond.

"Fucking shit Susan, are you kidding me? I thought that it was Yametetsu and at bitch in the corporate towers. A lot of our men died up there."

"It wasn't me."

"Don’t you fucking lie to me."

"It wasn't directly me, then. We needed a reason— a utility to them. Now they can’t trust the drones."

"So, what, you kill dozens of people?"

"No, they did… Yamatetsu. And they didn't need my 'blessing' Frank. They are on our side. They WARNED us because they are going to lash out. Did you know there is a strike team down here already? Faster than a fucking FRT and they want blood."

She looks away, "Doesn't matter— we purchased a solution for them— if just to buy us time, get us a bargaining chip…"

Nine also assenses the woman to which the troll speaks, and Nine makes sure to play close attention, so she can relay all of this to her team later. She goes back to physical vision after having tried to assense the woman, and then Nine stays quiet for just a moment to listen further, but while trying to seem polite and wait her turn, until the woman speaks about Yamatetsu, "Oh, Yamatetsu… they are going to help us against the DF?" she inquires randomly.

Nine probably becomes very worried in her aura, if Cara can see it, though it does not seem to be worry attached to her. Nine masks it physically.

"Who are you?" says the woman. Based off of checking her aura— she is a mixed bundle of emotion. The Boss lady looks from the woman to Irons as he says, "Just another one of your 'kids' looking to help. They're scared shitless out there, you know, and they are in the dark. You're acting just like the SINners right now."

She growls back, "Don't start with me, Irons. Anyway— the Yamatetsu are our allies, little one, and that’s what’s important. We need allies like them right now since the Draco Foundation isn’t one of them."

Nine nods some after hearing the confirmation that they want Yam help, "Then…" Nine's heartbeat goes up a little bit, and then she explains soft while piping it through her comm to the team, "Please, you must listen to me very carefully. Why do you think that those at the elevator take no action? Not doing anything? They are not here for the obvious reasons. You could be blowing possible allies." Nine gently tries to drop hints and doubts without actually saying that the team is with Yamatetsu. "They have not hurt anyone."

Elsewhere… near the Elevator.

Frost frowns and stops, his attention now focused on his present location, he slowly moves towards the elevator and looks around, his senses slipping into the astral realm as he looks for signs of anything odd.

Air continues to pace, keeping one eye on Adam, one eye on the surrounding area which makes him look very much like a hawk hopped up on a serious amount of caffeine. His tooled up Alpha hangs down his chest off his LBE gear, hands free to swing at his sides.

Frost turns and looks around, frowning under his helmet, he finally gets on the comm, and he checks his pistol and taser as he speaks.

Commlink-Snowman> Frost says, "Something’s not right, everyone keep very alert right now."

Something is definitely not right. There is tension in the air that can practically be tasted right before there is a thunder crack in the distance and a muzzle flash from far and high.

The next thing that is seen is an explosion of blood as a bullet rips through Adam's shoulder, cutting through the armor. His body twists out of the chair and back down onto the floor.

His eyes snap open and the soft, melodic Enochian stops. Instead he mouths a silent scream— followed by a shivered grunt. « Spells.. Down.. Can't hold them.. » he comms over as he looks for some cover. Much pain.

It is at the end of this speech that Nine's Mask drops. "What the…" says the troll as he pulls the shotgun from off his back. Like a bad Terrintino movie, just about every person in there draws their guns and points it at the woman.

Quickly, in a flash, Nine is no longer Kelly but Nine, and she does not care what she looks like or all the weapons pulled on her, but she does get to a point where she becomes worried about what happened to Adam, » "Sir, are you ok?" « she comms, unless someone shoots her. She looks frustrated and then looks to the troll who should know her. "Make this stop!" she demands, and then tries to state, "Remember me? How I said people want to help?" Fuming, Nine finally gets a grip, unless someone has shot through her already.

Frost rushes over towards Adam, mentally commanding Jupiter, Saturn and Nero to come and prepare to serve. Once he reaches Adam he covers him and looks around for any signs of the sniper.

The woman over in Nine's shipping container puts a hand to her ear as he says over to Irons, "They geeked the mage." Hey, that’s Shadowrunning 101 isn’t it? "Do you know this woman?" she asks as she looks over towards Nine, "She with them?

The large troll lowers the shotgun just a little bit, "The Doctor? What’s your game, girl? You with that strike team?" He seems like he wants to believe she is sincere— but it could all just be a clever farce just as easily.

Nine with her mask down, turns toward the exit route unless someone is ready to shoot her. She will only pause long enough to say, "YES I AM." and then hold her hands up and try to step toward the exit, intending to leave, "Geeked my COMRADE." she growls lowly, being quite frustrated with the news, and she maybe is not doing the most smart of things by trying to leave, but she is choosing this path despite knowing they might get fussy. Nine speaks all of her statements very quietly despite the capitalized words being INTENSE. "Let me go heal him." She becomes a bit demanding.

Air snaps around, looking for the direction from which the shot to Adam came. His hands go to the Alpha and he brings it up ready to his shoulder. He crouches a little and does the squaddies walk towards the nearest chunk of heavy metal to get down behind.

"Move and you'll join him alright," says the woman as she draws a pistol after her first step. "You've got exactly ten seconds to explain yourself before I order my men to open fire." The troll says, "Exactly ten seconds." Shotgun pump.

In Air's side of things— it’s hard to determine where the sniper came from. The muzzle flash gives a cardinal direction— but nothing is over there now. There is a voice over a loudspeaker, not unlike Air's own system: "Put down your weapons. Lie down and put your hands behind your head. This is your first, and only warning."

Nine forces herself to stop moving, knowing they are serious and that she cannot help Adam if she is dead. "We are not your enemies but could have been good allies to have. Yametetsu hired us. Please, you must not let this information get into the wrong hands." Nine is soft toned but a little whiny.

Frost gets a warning from Cara that Nine is in trouble and gets ready for that. "Jupiter, Saturn, go and wait near Nine, Cara will give you my orders when the time comes." he then looks around and calls Venus and Mercury to come and serve him. He keeps an eye out for the sniper, and crouches over Adam to prevent any further shots from hitting him.

"Yamatetsu hired you?" the Troll says with a bit of shock, "How do you expect me to believe that when you have DF SINs and are working for them?" The woman continues, "And I have not heard of another shadow op team being down here…" She shakes her head, "If what you say is true, then orders your men to stand down /now/ or they will be shot." Oh this should be interesting, considering Air is the squad leader.

The icy haired mage has a hand over his wound— trying to keep it from bleeding to the best of his ability with compression. The sticky fluid seeps over his natural hands as he just breathes— in about as good a cover as he is going to get with the elementals, Air, and Frost there.

Air isn't for throwing down his weapons, it would take far too long. He hunkers down behind some of those chunks of metal and switches out his magazine on the Alpha to something a little more powerful. He speaks out from his suit speaker, "Afraid not, can't stand being weaponless, call it paranoia." He peers over to scan the area.

Nine glances toward the troll, "Fakes?" she mentions as if it were an easy thing to guess but seems quite frustrated, obviously emotionally attached to her people. Nine glances around at all of the auras of those who have weapons aimed toward her, just in case any of them seem to be 'flaky' people. Nine grunts and gets on the comm, »

"Leader, we are told to stand down or that our people at the elevator will be shot. I think it is wise to not engage in any combat, hopefully you have not done so." Nine does not make orders like the woman suggested. Nine looks over to Susan, frowning deeply, "Can I go heal my comrade now?" Nine is somewhat insistent, also going back to physical vis.

Commlink-Little Sister> Nine says, "Leader, we are told to stand down or that our people at the elevator will be shot. I think it is wise to not engage in any combat, hopefully you have not done so."

Commlink-Air> Air says, "We've already come under fire. It sounds like Yamatetsu already has people down here. We aren't fighting back. Yet."

The team makes its way back to the large freight elevator at the entrance to 'The Deep' aka Deep Storage. The space before the elevator is very open— as where moving equipment once was, has been stripped of the area to create a killing zone should forces come en masse down here.

The entire team notices something that was not there before— a 'What’s Wrong with this Picture' before and after. The large light next to the freight elevator is neither green— indicating it is on this level, yellow— indicating it is not moving, nor red— indicating it is topside. The power to it is dead.

Adam looks over. Since everyone has a grasp of electronics (yay!), it’s easy to assume that the power to it has been cut. It’s a very simple circuit for this sort of thing. "Peachy," the icy mage says sarcastically.

Frost frowns and shakes his helmeted head "Well, I'm going to assume that’s the only way out of here and now we have to act like electricians and try to fix it."

Air sighs to himself, examines the light momentarily and then turns around to address the Yama Ops, assuming they are still escorting.
They are. Biggs and his team are still here as they look that over.

Nine stays completely quiet, but she definitely scans the area for any enemies or shady types, maybe people that they did not see initially, and Nine even goes so far as to count heads on Biggs's team, to see if all of them are there with them right now.

And they are all there— present and have been in sight during the trek.

Air turns on his speaker, "Well scurry off and hide. Try not to send any more suicide bombers our way ok?" Then he turns off his suit's speaker system and instead opens up comms on the DF security channel, «Captain Smith to DF Security office come in?»

Nine slowly approaches the elevator door and the console, seeing if there was any tampering from this end, or if it was done elsewhere, any of the electronics and boxes or anything that might indicate here or up to?

Adam has already been shot once and has the hole in his robes to prove it. The concept of 'scurry off and hide' seems to suit him just fine, given the mental anxiety that a near death experience tends to do to you not even an hour after. He heads towards the sides— going towards the storage containers a ways off. At least if the shit hits the fan, he can always shoot.

« This is DF Security, over. »

Nine will determine after an examination that the panels down here show no sign of tampering. To do so, they would have had to take things off to get to the heart of the console. No paint scrapes— it still looks 'factory fresh, unhampered, and still has its warranty sticker'.

Frost remains quiet and just watches things, though he does call in his earth elementals to stand ready in case of any problems that could arise from this. He watches Adam move off and then shakes his head a bit.

Nine moves away from the console after checking it out, and she radios, » "Not shut down from this end of things." « on their own personal channel. Then, Nine realizes Adam hath scurried, so she does as well to follow him, moving to be close and near if needed. She whispers, "Hey…" gently.

Air comms «Looks like power is down to the elevator to Deep Storage. Is it down topside or this a localized fault? Over» Air scans around the elevator doors quickly before turning his attention back to the inner area of the Deep.

Adam looks over to Nine— toying with the ripping in his robe with a natural finger, "Mmm?" he emits.

« Hold. Checking the corresponding Power Grid. » There is a long wait. « There is a break in the grid on your side. Does your team have an Electronics Expert? »

Nine shrugs some, giving him a wan smile. "Just, sticking near you." she explains, blushing. "Want me to try to fashion your robe together again?" Nine keeps her left hand up over her heart while she gestures with the right, probably, it is the usual Nine pose as if she were ready to slip the left one into her coat and draw a firearm in case something odd happens. Paranoid.

Frost looks around, then noting that Air has this under control he heads towards Adam and Nine, he looks over Adams robes and frowns "What sort of armor do you wear with that anyway?"

Air glances around and then back at the elevator with a slightly unsure look on his face which changes into a grimace, «No specialist on the team. We all have our basic courses. Over»

Adam looks over to Nine and notes, "Please do. Smartlinks these days are too good and this would constitute a vulnerability." Standing by one of the containers now, he tells Frost, "Form Fitting Full suit underneath a Shiawise SecureTech Model 4. Surprisingly fashionable for day-to-day wear." Yes— it looks like a new-age armored robe.

Nine frowns faintly, "Gah, I dunno if I can… every time I try with the armored clothes, it gets really difficult." Nine reaches over and gives Adam's shoulder a gentle squeeze though, and she tries anyway, but nothing happens. Nine says "I seriously need to learn Fashion 9."

Frost nods "That’s about the level of protection I have on too, but with sniper rifles not even heavy security armor is going to stop them. We need to work on some magical armor for these situations."

« Roger. We will need you to gather intel to determine if we can issue down a specialist. Basic troubleshooting would include investigating the circuit breakers. There are 5 in the maintenance tunnel to the side. I am authorizing your ID to unlock it. Under no circumstance are you to allow additional personnel outside your team in that tunnel. Over. » Goooo corporate policy.

Adam looks thoughtful for a moment. Or lost in thought. He seems to come back, uncharacteristically just nodding to both what Frost and Nine said, "Yeah. I believe we have that in our Library."

Air glances to the maintenance shaft and tuts, «Understood. Over and out.» He then heads over to the tunnel entrance, switching back to local comms, «Time to get moving ladies.»

Frost looks over to Air, then to Adam, he smiles "Well, we should be safe from snipers for a while now." he then starts over towards Air.

Nine nods slightly and then slides her right arm around Adam briefly, quickly giving him one of her gentle squeezes before she lets go and gives him some space, just in case she needs to be ready for something creepy soon.

Nine moves when Air mentions that they need to move, and so she does after Adam.

Adam slings his Supermac into a more comfortable position and converges back on Air's position, "I don't know about that. Lately it seems like bullets have been programmed with smart rounds to home in on me. Whoever wrote the phrase 'Geek the mage first' in security textbooks I want to castrate."

Nine follows up after Adam and she keeps her eyes peeled for anything creepy.

Air gets to the door and goes about entering his code, or scanning his eye or whichever scan the door requires. «Alright, we got some kind of break down here, start with the circuit breakers.» He holds the door open.

Frost nods to Air, then steps into the doorway, looking around once he does. Cara rests on his shoulder and gives the astral plane her full attention while Frost concentrates on the mundane for now.

The door itself is a large, environmentally sealed chamber door. The code itself unlocks the bolts in the side— allowing it to creep open with a gush of air that is pulled in during pressurization. It gives a constant reminder that they are several leagues under the sea, where water pressure itself could possibly crush every bone in your body if not handled properly.

Adam nods as he heads in after Frost « 10-4 »

There is not much to the next room. You can walk about ten paces before you reach a metal ladder that leads— straight up. If you look up, periodic lights dot the bleak, gunmetal tapestry. It’s a long way up to topside.

Nine nods to Air, too, as she pauses to scan the tunnel before entering and then glance back over her shoulder to see if anyone is still following them or what they are doing, afraid some hungry or crazy person might notice them finding a way out of here. If all seems well, Nine will follow the others in.

Air turns to scan the immediate area before backing in through the door in a slight squaddies crouch, prepared for those crazies to rush the door before he can attempt to close it.

Commlink-Snowman> Frost groans slightly over the comm "Alright folks, it’s time to climb, everyone take care, strongest goes up last in case someone slips and they have to be caught. Also, if someone did this on purpose, they still could be hiding up there someplace. Adam, do you want to do an astral scan up the tubes? I'd send Cara, but she can't defend herself."

Commlink-Aquis> Adam says, "Roger"

Commlink-Little Sister> Nine says, "If someone slips and the whole team gets knocked off the ladder or the weakest person makes it up but is fatigued in the face of danger, what do we do?"

Adam finds a nice place to sit down. Since one does not exist— he just sits down where he is at. His spirit slips out of his body and starts to scan up the corridor. Dum de dum.

Commlink-Snowman> Frost says, "Let's take a look, there might be areas up above where we can rest, breaks in the ladder. I'm sure it’s not a solid climb all the way up."

Nine is one of those 'weakest links', and she would rather not make anyone catch her! She finds herself a spot upon the wall which to lean, making sure not to be in the way of Air and the door closing operation.

Air makes sure the door is all sealed up tight and locked again and finally turns around to watch the rest of the group. «Iceboy, you'll be up first followed by Number and then Waterboy. I'll come up last. Mainly because I'm not squeezing past anyone in this armour.»

Adam is gone for a while— making his way up and down. When he returns to his body he lets everyone know, "For the material world— as far as I can tell the ladder is intact. But considering it’s like looking for coal in the dark— I could be wrong. As for ambushers— no astral signatures. Towards the top there is still quite the emotional haze of pain, anxiety, and violence from earlier."

Frost nods to Adam and then grabs onto the ladder "Ok, guess I'll go up first. We need to keep an eye out for any signs of tampering to the electrical setups." Frost starts up the ladder.

Adam heads up the ladder second. Thank god for all the gym time, he is going to need it.

Nine nods and then she moves away from where she was wall leaning and heads on up the ladder after frost, making sure to give him enough room so she does not get kicked in the face and cause him to falter. She scans any of the electronics that might be able to be seen on the way up, otherwise silent.

Air waits for the three to get sufficiently up the ladder, and then waits a few rungs more before starting up. He's barely encumbered by the armour so the whole thing isn't too arduous, more of a pain from the weight of gear than anything.

The team makes it up for a long while. The circuits are fairly easy to see— mainly because they have catwalks out to them. More like 'small metal mesh catwalks that support one person standing on them to do work'. And heavy armor is a risk— they are engineered for lightweight people.

The team boringly goes through the first three when they see that the upcoming fourth may be the culprit. The fuse box, or whatever the hell it is in 2060s, is left open.

Air rests at each box, furthest down of the group, bracing back against the wall to rest his arms, well… one of them anyway.

Frost climbs up past the forth box, giving room for one of the more skilled people to check it out

Commlink-Snowman> Frost says, "This one is open, who wants to check it?"

Nine is fairly nimble for a human mage, and she does decently well at making sure to keep Cat-like Balance, even if it is only a WoD merit. 2nd, Nine moves up close to Frost and gives the scene a once over with her eyes.

Commlink-Little Sister> Nine says, "I can, since I'm here."

Nine slinks off of the ladder and onto the CATwalk, on the catwalk, yeah!

Adam stays in his order— which puts him and Frost above the catwalk. He finds a nice place to rest while this one is investigated. "Reminds me of rock climbing in the Rockies— only more organized."

Commlink-Air> Air says, "Heads up! Get off that catwalk and back on the ladder!"

As soon as Air mentions, Nine backs off the catwalk and tries to scramble onto the ladder again! She tries to be quick, heart starting to pound.

Frost looks down as the command goes through, then suddenly Cara is standing in mid air beneath the catwalk pushing up against it in her human form. She isn’t too strong, but it might just help keep Nine from falling.

Adam looks around for the 'What' and 'Whys' of that.

Nine almost lost her footing somehow, but then she scrambles back onto the ladder quickly with the will to survive motivating her, as well as Cara assisting in pushing her and keeping her from falling even as one of her predator boots slips. Really not wanting to fall on Air, Nine clutches a rung in her left hand and the side of the ladder in her right hand for dear life, and she dangles a little bit like a kid on a jungle gym before finally bending her knees and writhing her body a bit to get her feet flat and steady on one of the rungs.

Commlink-Little Sister> Nine says, "Thanks for the warning… *pant*"

Commlink-Snowman> Frost says, "Let's try this a different way, Nine, how hard would it be for you to look at things, and then tell Cara what to do?"

Air braces himself against the ladder anyway, just in case.

"What the frag," Adam says as he looks in the only logical direction. Up. His eyes slip into the blue in blue as he sees what can only be described as a cloud of darkness plummeting towards them. Like an astral smoke bomb.

And then the hell comes down. The well-known sound of submachinegun fire ripples through the corridor in echoes— muzzle flashes revealing brief glimpses of the attacker just seconds after Nine gets back on the ladder. The bullets rain down as the 'thing' crashes down onto the wire mesh— only breaking part of the fall as the platform buckles and snaps like a metal branch when the humanoid goes through it.

The creature goes straight past the time. Gravity is a bitch like that. Sparks fly as he begins to skid to a stop several meters below them. Anchoring down there— gunfire blazes straight up, chewing into the person at the bottom of the ladder order (Air).

Air can't really do anything from his position on the bottom of the ladder. Thankfully the security armour does most of the work as the bullets impact all over his lower body painfully. "Ahh ow!" he verbalizes, but he's inside a sealed helmet, no sounds get out.

Underneath the figure, out of his sight she hopes, Cara materializes and studies the figure for any signs of weakness, she see's none and doesn't act.

Air is in a progressively bad mood for this climb, and when he gets all shot up, it gets worse. Glancing down he notices the thing stuck down below him and turns, dropping off the ladder and sticking one foot out straight to kick the guy, gracefully falling right on top of him.

As Air gets closer, which is a rough 20m drop, he gets a better view of what it is they are fighting. Metal. Almost pure metal. Cyberskull and all. One arm of nothing but a large monosword— stuck into the wall that holds him there. The other is a large, metal fist with a gun mounted on the forearm. As he aims the kick, a blazing fast reaction erupts— causing the full strength of the gun arm to back hand him with enough force to send him towards the other side of the vertical tunnel's wall. Crap + gravity.

Seeing as having Air plummet to his potential doom doesn’t sit well with Adam— he reaches his natural hand down, "Air!" he shouts— probably beating Nine to the gasp of 'Oh crap' by an eighth of a measure on a 160 tempo. The forces of Mana pull from the fabric of the astral— negating his descent and directing him back towards the ladder. That would put him below Cara and Mr. Metal.

Cara vanishes back to the astral plane, there is nothing she can do here and now.

Frost shakes his head and gives orders to his elementals "Jupiter, Saturn, ground him and kill him, Flee if damaged!"

Nine realizes after an 8th of a measure on the 160 tempo as Adam wrote, that Air is in trouble, and so she jerks her green eyed gaze downward and there is a moment where she feels quite queasy. There is little time to spare, though, so she quickly reacts to try to eliminate the threat, and she pulls mana down and toward their enemy, giving it her highest force casting and power level, and once it goes off, it gives her something to remember it by slapping her with some aftershock drain in return. Nine growls lowly.

The metallic creature is on his way to swinging the gun barrel back up towards the team when the mana crushes into what could be considered his 'soul'. A chilling, metallic scream erupts from its voice box as the thing spasms out— staying lodged into the wall thanks to the sword-arm. Then, after some jerking, goes limp.

Frost grimaces as the guy goes slack "Jupiter, Saturn, abort!"

Air clings onto the ladder again after Adam saves him with a rather disconcerting levitate spell. «Thanks.» He turns to look up and view the monster thing, climbing the ladder to get level with it.

Nine stares at the creature a split second longer before she glances down the tunnel toward Air to see if he is going to be okay. She bites her lower lip but then breathes out a deep sigh and sags against the ladder after realizing that Air will indeed be okay. She whispers, "Yes, thank you." but then grunts softly. She situates herself on the ladder and then mentions…

Commlink-Little Sister> Nine says, "I only stunned and maybe hurt it, what do we do with it?"

Commlink-Snowman> Frost says, "Kill it before it wakes up, you can’t negotiate with a full borg like that. Put a bullet in its head."

Adam lets go of the ladder and levitates himself down to Air and Mr. Metal to get a closer look. « Kill it. It’s an abomination of cruelty and injustice. » The words flow from his mouth like venom as his metal hand goes over the full metal carapace and looking for a place to finish it off that will actually do the damn job.

Air gets level with the thing and Adam, «Check it for chipjacks, datajacks, anything that we can take with us that may have some information on it. Or else something identifying.» He starts scanning the thing for those himself.

Nine slowly descends with methodic carefulness, since her new headache made her kinda dizzy. She grunts and then pauses when near, but not in the way of Adam and Air being able to move. She kolas onto the ladder.

Commlink-Little Sister> Nine says, "Wish we could do some quick ripper surgery and then interrogate it." Wow, Nine seems not very kind right now, but it did shoot at them. "I could wake it up, but that might be dangerous, too.""

Commlink-Aquis> Adam says, "Nine… It doesn’t care. It’s a zombie. It doesn’t feel fear. Its soul is tricked and confined into a metal husk while the body does what it is told. If it wasn’t for simsense, it wouldn't even feel, and it can probably just turn that off."

Commlink-Snowman> Frost says, "Damn shame to just waste all the materials, but we don't know any good ripperdocs in the area. Maybe we can send him to the bottom and let the people below scrap him for parts?"

Air spots the datajack and he scowls for a moment. «Anyone with a pocsec or other storage device that they don't mind possibly losing?» He examines the monosword out of vague interest.

Commlink-Little Sister> Nine realizes finally what Adam means, "Oh…" she subvocalizes softly. "Okay. I have a flip phone and a few hand phones, but my #9 pocsec is trademark. I got some chips."

Commlink-Aquis> Adam says, "I have just the one— and losing it would be no bueno for work."

Commlink-Snowman> Frost says, "I'll give up mine, we need the information more than I need a pocsec"

Commlink-Air> Air says, "«Alright, get that thing passed down, relay style."

Nine offers up a hand to do the relay thing.

Adam floats up to Nine/Frost. Magic, you make life so easy. Except when everyone effing shoots you first because of it.

Frost holds onto the ladder and then holds his pocsec out to mid-air. Cara appears and then takes the thing down to Adam "People, you forget I have friends too."

Adam doesn’t have to float far to get it from Cara— then down to Air. « I don’t think any of us are thinking straight. A cyber zombie just tried to make us into chunky salsa. »

Nine wavers a bit after holding her hand up as if she was some poor soul asking for bread, and she just lets her hand drop back down onto the ladder and holds on with a soft little groan. She puts her forehead against a rung, and then she closes her eyes and attempts to nap while standing up.

Commlink-Little Sister> Nine says, "I can't think very well, yeah."
Commlink-Little Sister> Nine says, "I think I took some drain, urg."

Commlink-Snowman> Frost says, "Yea, but you dealt with the monster nine, so I think we all owe you for that one."

Air grunts inside his suit, «I was convinced I was about to fall and break my legs so… yeah.» He takes the pocsec and runs a data cable form it to the datajack, scanning the small computer for information in there.

Air taps away on the pocsec, curses loudly in his suit in Swedish and taps some more. «Fragging thing is all to hell.» He finally manages to rip off a copy of the remains from resident memory before disconnecting the data cable. «Well, better than nothing. Now, who rigged this trap for us and why? We need to get topside.»

Commlink-Little Sister> Nine says, "Maybe it has something to do with the cranial bomb thing. Or, maybe the thing is just crazy and decided to not like us. Or, ouch."

Adam pops out his runic punch dagger and stabs right into the back of the neck. He strains to dislodge thing from the wall— then levitating it nearby unless he hears some explosives about to go off. "I don't know what to think anymore. Exodus. Cyber zombies. Shadow Ops working for the side that their employees appear to be butchering." He shakes his head— getting back on the ladder to get up, "One step at a time. Where are we going from here once we get topside?"

Commlink-Snowman> Frost says, "This place is insane"

Nine starts to progress upward after the borg is taken care, and she is careful and a little slower than before, semi distracted by the new headache, but she does okay otherwise. "Maybe we are so convincing they think we really are the opposition." she murmurs softly, but not over the comm.

Commlink-Snowman> Frost says, "Are we going to try to fix that panel, or just climb out of here?"

Commlink-Air> Air says, "We've ascertained the problem, I'll add it to the report. Let’s climb out of here."

Nine remains silent for now after that, and she starts to pick up her pace upward and stays careful about it.

Frost starts climbing again, Cara once more riding on his shoulder.

Nine grunts softly but manages to get up to the top with her team, probably suggesting quietly that they hide the corpse if at all possible, knowing someone might have a spell or an effect of some kind? Maybe.

Commlink-Aquis> Adam says, "Yeah. I can hide it. Someone else want to carry it? Or maybe we can have an elemental help with all that."

Commlink-Snowman> Frost says, "No good, Earth Elementals can’t fly and they won’t be able to climb with it. Going to need to use magic on it"

Commlink-Little Sister> Nine says, "What about an air elly?"

Commlink-Snowman> Frost says, "Not strong enough, least I don't think it will be"

Air slips the pocsec into a pouch on his belt kit and gets to climbing. He's silent for a while, his mind busy contemplating the implications of a cyberzombie attacking them after sabotage.

The team quickly approaches the top— easily defined as 'the top' since they cannot go any higher and there is a platform that leads to another chamber lock that Air opened to get in this wonderful tunnel of doom.

Commlink-Aquis> Adam says, "What about when we get up top? No— then instead of a zombie walking around, we have an elemental carrying an invisible object around…"

Commlink-Snowman> Frost says, "That I can do, once we reach the top I can have an Earth carry it for us"

Frost makes his way into the chamber lock, and waits for the others to join him in the place of safety.

Air brings up the rear on the ladder, hand over hand, foot over foot. The repetition helping him center his mind for the deep thought required here. It does have the side effect of making him very quiet as the team filters into the chamber lock up top.

Nine crawls up into the chamber lock and then groans lowly after finally finding a spot where she can stand instead of climb tons of ladder! She does not complain much further, though, and she scans her immediate area with deep green Irish eyes, and then she glances down toward Air to check on him until he gets here, offering him a hand to help him steady onto the flat area when he gets here, since she was 3rd off the rungs.

Adam clambers up second— taking his time as his thoughts are preoccupied with keeping that boat anchor afloat. When he gets to his feet— he moves the hunk of metal up as well— setting it down gracefully. He exhales, "Jesus that thing weighs a ton." Megakinesis. Need Megakinesis!

Frost shakes his head and nods "Alright, well, I have an idea too. I might be able to get Jupiter to carry it engulfed, that way you don’t even have to hide it."

Air climbs up not taking Nine's hand because you know, he weighs quarter of a metric ton in this armour and the long climb was tiring enough without yanking Nine and dropping her down the hole. He looks around at the others slowly then focuses on the dead zombie on the floor.

As the zombie’s body is laid out on the ground, a large mass of earth appears underneath it, forcing it upright into a standing position, the earth then spreads out over the body, covering it and forming a roughly humanoid shape, the core of which is now the metal frame of the cyberzombie.

Nine backs up from Air to make sure he has room enough when she sees that he is not taking her help. For a moment she almost frowns but then the more logical side of things helps her realize what might happen, so she just watches him with worry to make sure he is okay. Once he is up on the flat, Nine turns to look toward the earth elemental, and then looking to Frost and wowing softly, "Smart." she compliments, and then to Adam she asks, "Are you doing okay, sir?"

"I'm just fine," Adam says— but he would likely say that if he was bleeding from the skull. Looking over towards Air, he mentions, "But I would check with him. He’s been awfully quiet and did just have a handful of 'close' calls a second ago."

Air waves a hand in Adam's vague direction while watching the cyberzombie get engulfed. "I'm wondering who has the resources to send one of those. Or has the resources to keep one on standby for trouble. I think we need to check out this data before we do anything here. And I have the DF security to wonder about too."

Frost watches the Elemental engulf the zombie then looks around "So what’s our next step? Report back to DF our failure or what?"

Nine immediately moves to be closer to Air when the suggestion is made that she check up on him, even though she was fussing over him. "I think we are supposed to review the info we got from the zombie, like the man said." Nine gives the arm of Air's security suit a soft squeeze, and she does seem to worry and also to watch over Air, but she does not say anything else.

As the zombie’s body is laid out on the ground, a large mass of earth appears underneath it, forcing it upright into a standing position, the earth then spreads out over the body, covering it and forming a roughly humanoid shape, the core of which is now the metal frame of the cyberzombie.

Adam wonders— "Yeah— but do we have the equipment to do that kind of analysis?"

Frost frowns "We can't let DF do it, the information in there could give away our cover story."

Air shakes his head, "I have no idea if even DF Security has enough. I agree with Frost in that we should keep this little gem to ourselves. I can try to get access to a terminal while everyone takes some R&R and we resupply after I've given a report."

Nine hmms but then nods to what is said, and she has nothing to add, so she just leans herself against a wall, sighing quietly due to aching muscles and aching brain meats from having taken the mana drain previously.

"Sounds like a plan," Adam says— slipping into Astral and checking Nine to make sure she didn't bust an astral muscle with her last stunt.

Frost gestures and the Elemental/Zombie moves over to stand beside him "I suppose they won’t mind if I have an elemental hanging around me right, just say I'm a little paranoid about ambushes."

Adam offers, "Let's just hope no one assenses it…" All the awakened present will be slightly unnerved by the zombie's presence the same way an Eskimo will be unnerved by a vacation in the Bahamas.

Air nods to Frost a little tiredly, "It's a visible deterrent and you're a security officer. Now let’s get going, I could use a nap."

Frost looks at the Elemental then back to Adam "Imagine how he feels" he jerks a thumb towards the Elemental. "Cara can't stand to be near the thing."

Nine is semi tired and lightly stunned, but otherwise, she seems okay. Aura wise, there is animosity toward the engulfed creature, probably for being a danger to them earlier, even though it is dead, there is some mistrust there that it actually is, unvoiced though. She indeed is unnerved, just by having it near them. She moves to stand up more straight and gets ready to follow. Also, as usual, Nine is emotionally fretting over Air, but she tries to keep all of that to a minimum on the physical plane, looking to just be tired now.

All that stands between them and 'civilization' is a door. Not just any door— a solid door like the one they encountered below. By the same theory— Air's auth should work.

Adam rubs the side of his head after he finishes reading Nine's aura and notes, "I try not to. Too much empathy can be debilitating."

Air gives everyone the last chance to pull themselves together before starting to try and slide through the mass to the door in the tight area. Squeezing past materialized elemental and team member alike before finally trying to open up the door, same was as before.

Frost is composed, actually he is composed almost all the time, and rarely do his emotions get the better of him. He simply moves on to the next task mentally instead of dwelling on what happened. He waits patiently for Air to open the door.

When the door finally hisses open— the hallway spills out into the familiar Port Authority. They are not far from the elevator that took them up. Things have calmed down up here, but only in the sense that it is not pure chaos. Things are still heavily busy.

One thing that has changed by note is the guard and personnel have more than doubled. This time the people are not just Draco— but Yame's too. Part of the 'open area' has been converted into medical station for minor injuries. Minor being anything nonfatal at this point.

Air pushes the door open and steps out, coughing to clear his throat as he glances around to take in the scene, moving a few steps away t make room for the rest of his team. Thankfully all those bullet impacts are on his back so it isn't immediately apparent that he's been peppered except to everyone behind him.

Nine moves out after Air, probably having squeezed her way to be near, and then she moves aside to leave the opening open for the rest of the team. Realizing that there are holes in the armor, Nine frowns and asks softly, "Did you get hurt?"

Commlink-Air> Air says, "Not the time for questions right now. Nothing went through."

Frost moves out after Nine, with his Elemental in tow. The thing moves stiffly, trying not to let the metallic core show through. Frost glances about after exiting, taking note of the increased security, but he makes no comment, merely waits for Airs orders.

Nine frowns slightly but then broods off to the side, becoming blank in her expression finally as she waits for the team and orders.

Frost starts assensing everyone around them in the crowd, and has Cara do the same with him, he is looking for anyone whose aura shows surprise that they walked out of the tunnels alive, perhaps the zombie had a handler up here on the surface

The team, sans Air, finds a place to rest and be 'out of the way' while the Squad Leader goes off to debrief. It gives a moment for them to collect their thoughts and recover after a handful of tense situations down below.

On the other hand, Air gets quite a bit more than the rest. Going back to report the situation— the man in charge doesn’t seem all that surprised. He informs them that the Yametetsu Ambassador has already traced back this evening's occurrence to a decker that is causing havoc in the system. The pay for the job is not the same if they would have brought the woman in— but instead paid for as intel. The team is given clearance to leave the Port Authority. They will not head from the Deep's Leader in some time at this rate, but they are definitely going to need actual manpower in the coming days if the drones have been compromised. An uneasy peace.

One last thing— Air has been personally requested by the Ambassador to bring /all/ members of his team with him and join her in the Yametetsu Tower this evening. Which gives them— oh about an hour to get over there.

Nine finds herself a cot somewhere that seems okay where she can sleep, and she makes sure to let Air know via watcher spirit mail where she is, and then she goes to take her cat nap, though it is difficult for her to get rest, being all wound up from the issues they just had down below and in tunnels.

Frost remains quiet and lets Nine rest, he has no idea what to do with his elemental package though, this might get difficult

Adam is resting as well— but has his mind on other things. Now that he has a second to mull out some of the details— he goes on the trix to do some social research into the things down here. The first thing that comes to mind are forums and chatrooms in case someone is talking.

Air reports and gets debriefed and then receives the request from the Ambassador. He makes quick time back to the sleeping area where the watcher informed him the team had bedded down, and enquires after some hot food, or failing that cold food for everyone. Getting some sort of tucker arranged for the team.

Finally, Nine gets herself to sleep, sighing softly, being a not so happy camper right now. She does get her rest, though, the headache clearing.

Nine sits up after realizing Air is back, and she greets him with her usual soft smiles that note when she usually feels 'better' than before. Quietly, she listens to everything, and she runs some spells to make everyone feel better, like healthy glow and sterilize if they want them. She nods, standing up and then checking her gear momentarily.

Frost frowns slightly as he hears the news "So where do we stash our package? Or do we want to show the ambassador?"

Nine would be quite happy to eat an MRE, even if it looks pretty nasty, because Nine is like disposal girl! For those who rather NOT, well, they can come over and get some nutrition and fast for 12 hours, if they really want! They would have to ask though. Nine eats the food with as spoon she uses in one hand while the other holds the steaming open bag. Pausing and swallowing, "Prolly, we should make sure we're really dealing with the ambassador before we go taking it to show anyone?" she offers, then starts chowing down again!

Adam looks up from his pocsoc that he has been surfing with, "We have to entertain the possibility that they are right— that Yame is behind this." He looks over towards the Earth Elemental, "But they may also have the only technology capable of handling this."

Frost nods "If we could dissect the package and check for design specifics, we might be able to trace the manufacturer, and usually these things are made by the people who use them, rarely is this stuff contracted out."

Air chows down on his MRE too, but mainly because he needs the nutrition and not the flavour. "I never really heard about Yam using those but, anything is possible. We have no time to do anything though so we'll need to keep it out of sight for now."

Frost takes his meal and eats as well, knowing their next meal could end up being a long time from now.

Nine listens to them and nods, "I keep thinking it maybe just escaped. Maybe it has nothing to do with us or anything other than some corp has this, and it got out and went slinking around on a rampage to… do something."

Adam doesn’t mind that his MRE is cold. His Field Work trips have had him eating worse, "Both Draco and Yame have some significant industry down here." He produces the pocsoc over towards Air and shows him the business information of the operations in the Aquacology. "Yame— keeping to their high technology and cybernetics front and Draco Foundation doing a lot of work with Sixth World research. Both due to location. I would not be surprised if R&D or paradigm shift in protocol has been involved. Or enough tech is spilling about that rogue entities could utilize it."

"That thing costs millions— and requires very specific, obscure magic and facilities," Adam says towards Nine, "It's not something you lose like a lost earring."

Air looks over what Adam shows him and hmms, "So combined they easily have the knowledge to do it, but doesn't this sort of thing involve plenty of ritual? It's a shame that this seems so central to our mission here. We might have to dig to the bottom, and thus find our culprit and complete everything." He grimaces a bit and then finishes off his bag o' food.

Nine seems to be in a better mood, probably from eating and them all getting to sit still and down and talk for a while. She nods some, "True, but maybe it chopped up everyone, maybe during the drone havoc, some security systems were disabled and the thing managed to get out of there on its own? Mmm." Nine grimaces as well!

Frost shakes his head "Always assume the worst, that way if you’re wrong, it’s for the better. The thing was after us specifically, it waited until we went down, disabled the elevators and waited in ambush for us. So far we know our cover story is either blown, or someone is after DF forces."

Adam takes his pocsoc back afterwards and nods a little bit, "The technology to craft it and the rituals are both obscure. That, I believe, works in our benefit. We would just need to track down who created it. It couldn't have come from the outside— it’s like getting a Tank through all those checkpoints."

Nine contemplates quietly, "Ah! Yes. Not saying not to assume badly, but maybe someone is looking for it and wants it back, and I wonder if they bugged the hell out of it or not?" she offers up. Nine hmms and then eats.

Nine glances to the exit of the place where they are right now, then the elly.

Frost smiles faintly "How much you want to bet they have a ritual link on him in storage, can we simply trace that back to them?"

Nine says "What if they are listening to us right now? What if they send a team?"

"Targeting someone with that kind of aura isn't easy," Adam admits, "they have a natural resistance to magic. And are physically resistant to gunfire. Most do have kill switches— which is why I am partially surprised that thing hasn’t exploded yet." The man shrugs, "They might be. But we have to press forward all the same."

Frost sighs "So do I keep lugging it around with my elemental then? I suppose that’s safest, we can't exactly hide it somewhere."

Nine mmhmm softly, and she focuses for a moment and brings her own elementals and watchers close to her on the astral plane, then she finishes up her MRE.

Air just munches through the remains of his ration stoically, listening to the magic conversation going on around him. "Might be better to keep the elemental with him here, rather than wander with it. Or perhaps keeping it with us is better, I'm not sure about that. But we have an appointment to meet with the ambassador, let's not be late."

Adam clambers to his feet— putting his pocsoc away. "That’s right. Not a whole lot of notice— seems like a reoccurring theme world-round. Hurry here, hurry there…" For once maybe he will be able to stroll through something. Like a forest. Without a bear chasing him.

Frost stands up and shrugs "Alright, tell me what to do with the package, take it with us, or leave it here. You’re in charge Captain."

Nine gets up after finishing up the last scraps of her meal, and then she tosses the plastic spoon in the baggie and throws all this away into the trash bin. She glances around momentarily before wandering over toward Air, and then she just kind of lingers off to the side, letting herself swoon now while she still can before they have to leave their hidey place again.

Air sniffs and wipes a hand across his mouth, dropping his bag to one side as he stands up and starts fiddling with his helmet to close it up again. "Keep it with us, and get it to have a mean look on its face or something. It's not scary looking enough." Then he clips his helmet shut and sighs, heading towards the door after a quick safety check on his gear.

Although Adam is half tempted to paint an 'angry face' on the elemental— he does not. He does chuckle to himself— being the eccentric that he is. The mage does a check on his gear as well and heads out with the leader.

Frost shakes his head and then looks at the elemental, soon the visage of a skull appears in its head area, actually it just raised the zombies body up, then thinned out the earth around the head to make it look like it’s got a human sized skull of earth on top of it "Better?" he asks, then throws away his MRE and gets ready to go, checking his equipment.

Air checks the elemental and nods «Better.» Then he heads out, towards the Ambassadors’ office.

Nine pats herself down, and then she moves to follow out after Adam. She goes blank for now, drawing from some of her older attitude from before she was shot up and became emo. She glances around, staying observant, too.

Frost follows along behind the others, keeping Cara looking out on the astral plane for any signs of disturbances while he watches the mundane level for threats, his paranoia is high at the moment and he expects to be shot at any second.

And so the team of Shadowrunners makes their way to the final Gate on the Port Authority. It is still heavily guarded by the Draco Foundation— but producing the clearance necessary allows the team to pass. The earth elemental definitely gets some stares— and it gets filed in reports— but they are not going to detain a professional security detail much longer than they need to.

The city itself is enclosed completely, but you can't tell. Artificial skies and lighting make it look exactly like they were in a topside city. That is, of course, with the exception that some of the buildings do literally 'touch' the sky or the walls. Details. This also means that they need transportation over to the building, in which cab and professional sedan service is available. The later is what is given— considering corpers get themselves company rentals.

A few minutes later and they are at the head of the Yametetsu Tower. Remember the 'buildings that touch the sky'? Well the Yame building is one of the few that does. The valet sees the car is taken care of while the team gets out in front of the sheik, ebony tower. Spiffy.

Air gets out of the sedan, still in his now slightly battle worn armour, though still 'as-new' from the front. «Here we go.» He strides off towards the front of the building.
Adam looks up— all the way up— and then back down, "Peachy."

Nine emerges and then wows softly, staring up, but once Air has gotten away from them a few meters, Nine moves to quickly stride after him while she pays close attention to her surroundings while not making it too obvious.

Frost sighs and looks around, then to his Elemental and he frowns "I hope the elevator can support its weight."

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